A thought just crossed my mind i thought worth sharing:
Why not change hut maps to treasure maps in FFH 2 (the lair result which places a treasure chest)?
That would be fun on so many levels (edit: if not that hard to accomplish from a coding perspective of course...).
(and that would make chests common enough so it doesn't hurt all to much if the odd chest in fact is empty... + still keep the map functionality and actually expand the range by far + add a random aspect to it...)
2 Problems solved via one solution.
Everyone happy?